SIDE-CIC - Social Identity Cards in Construction – Social Dialogue Project

Brief description and main aims:

The construction industry in Europe has evolved dramatically over the past few decades, both in terms of technology, but also the sociology of the people working on and running construction sites. The sector can take advantage of the new technologies to improve transparency on construction sites, especially in the context of the growing fragmentation and increasing mobility of workers in the construction industry. This has led to more complexity of subcontracting chains and demands new ways to identify and verify workers and companies present on construction sites.

Across Europe, numerous sectoral social ID card schemes have been developed at national, regional, and local levels, all with various characteristics and functions. The project will identify good practice, the possibility for interconnection and propose input for a possible framework in the area of sectoral social ID cards.

The objective of this project is to guarantee the enforcement of EU rules, create a more transparent environment for workers, employers, and labour authorities and to foster fairer mobility of labour in the construction sector. The approach that the European social partners propose is:

1. To map the current situation of social identity cards in the EU, particularly as they pertain to the construction sector.
2. To carry out a feasibility study, focusing on the interconnectivity of the existing national schemes and contribute to defining the needs and possible regulatory gaps in the EU framework. The study should address two main aspects: the legal and technical framework.

Why FIEC is dealing with this topic:

The 2015 EFBWW*–FIEC project on social ID cards in construction recommended that any EU initiative should complement existing national schemes and demonstrate clear added value. It also highlighted unresolved issues concerning the use, storage, and processing of personal data, particularly in relation to cross-border data exchange. Building on recent developments, the current project adopts a different approach: focusing on the interconnectivity of national schemes and identifying needs and potential regulatory gaps within the EU framework.

*FIEC member in Spain, Confederación Nacional de la Construcción (CNC), does not support the joint FIEC- EFBWW recommendations published in the framework of this project.

*European Federation of Builders and Wood Workers (EFBWW)